


Something Good Happened in 1969

by moosemajesty



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Episode AU: s03e10 Blink, Episode: s03e10 Blink, F/F, F/M, Fun with non-linear meetings and memory blocks, Immortal Rose Tyler, Jackie Tyler/Pete Tyler (Pete's World) - mentioned, Light Angst, Meddling TARDIS, Metacrisis Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler - mentioned, Multi, Post-Episode AU: s04e13 Journey's End, Reunions, Romance, Tentoo is the Doctor, The TARDIS Ships It (Doctor Who), Time Lord Rose Tyler, ish, kind of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2020-02-05
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:46:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21946069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moosemajesty/pseuds/moosemajesty
Summary: "He wished he could fill an eternity in that hour, and live the life with her that they both deserved, that they never had."While stuck with Martha in 1969, the Doctor loses an entire hour. He has no idea why or how or what happened, but he can’t shake the feeling that it was nothing short of fantastic.It takes nearly 2000 years and three regenerations before the Doctor finally gets that hour back.
Relationships: Tenth Doctor & Martha Jones, Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler, The Doctor (Doctor Who)/Rose Tyler, Thirteenth Doctor & Yasmin Khan & Graham O'Brien & Ryan Sinclair, Thirteenth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Comments: 26
Kudos: 160





	1. The Doctor Forgets

The Doctor was running through the streets of London, excitedly sprinting toward Billy Shipton - a man who meant the world to him in that moment despite having never met him. His “timey-wimey detector” had finally gone off a few minutes before - which meant Billy must have finally arrived by way of Weeping Angel, which meant his TARDIS would follow, and he and Martha could finally get out of 1969. Martha, unfortunately, was still at work, so that meant he was on his own for this one. Oh, well. Couldn’t be helped.

He couldn’t help the grin that was spreading across his face as he rejoiced in the idea of finally being home in his ship. The long stretch of waiting was nearing its end. He longed for his books, his mallet, and, of course, the entirety of time and space at his fingertips. Not to mention, the tension in the one-bedroom flat he shared with Martha was becoming downright unbearable. They worked much better together when they had some illusion of personal space and privacy.

The Doctor stopped when he reached the location of the temporal displacement. He was standing at the entrance to an alley - a rather foul-smelling and disgustingly damp alley, to boot. No Billy then. Actually, there was nothing in the alley, save for a small shack at the far end. It almost looked like a storage shed, or an outhouse. Not terribly out of place for such an alley, but it definitely didn’t contain the individual whose arrival would usher in the end of this infernal time loop.

He stared down at the device in his hand and tried to refrain from throwing it against the wall. Clearly, it needed recalibrating _again_ , but at least it didn’t explode a coop full of prize hens this time.

Just as he was about to turn on his heel and head back to the flat, he heard a door click shut in the alleyway.

“Hi,” a voice called out.

His shoulders stiffed and he stopped dead in his tacks. _That_ voice. It was stitched into his hearts forever. The first voice to grace this set of ears…

The first face this face ever saw.

 _No,_ he didn’t dare hope.

He whipped his head around, ready to write the whole thing off, when he laid eyes on her. She leaned casually against the shed, her leather-clad arms crossed over her chest and a wide smile spreading across her face. A choked sound escaped from his throat and his brain ceased all higher-processing functions.

His feet did the rest, carrying him at a breakneck speed toward her in the alleyway before he could even think. He crashed into her arms, and she stumbled to accomodate the force of the hug. He held her tightly for an inhuman amount of time, albeit a bit awkwardly as he was still grasping the timey-wimey detector for dear life.

“Rose,” he whispered her name, burying his face in her shoulder and breathing in the scent of her hair. “You’re a sight for sore eyes.”

“Could say the same to you,” Rose laughed, pulling away.

The Doctor ached with the absence of her in his arms, but took the opportunity to take in every inch of her standing before him. She looked almost exactly as he remembered, save for a few things. Her formerly platinum blonde hair was now the color of honey, pulled back into a loose ponytail. She looked like she hadn’t aged a day since Canary Wharf - her skin was just as smooth, her smile just as wide.

He still couldn’t help the giddy grin on his face. “I missed you so much.”

She smiled back, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Me too.”

Her eyes. That was the only thing that was truly different about her. There was a quality about them, almost as if…

“Oh, Rose,” he sighed in realization. “How long has it been?”

“Since Canary Wharf? ’Bout a century,” she answered candidly, wringing her hands together.

100 years for her amounted to just months for him.

He hugged her once more. “I’m so sorry, Rose. If I had known…”

Rose quickly placed a finger to his lips, shutting him up. “Bad Wolf did lots of things, not all of them… _bad_ ,” she joked, a mysterious glint in her eyes.

Once he let her go, he just stared at her for a moment. It wasn’t that the news shocked him, so much. The Time Lords didn’t ever study the long term biological consequences of looking into the Time Vortex - and certainly not on humans. It saddened him, to know that all this time Rose had been locked away in a parallel world, doomed to watch everyone she loved wither and die around her, while she remained the same. All the while, he’d tried to comfort himself with the knowledge that she was living a wonderful human life - the one adventure he could never have. No wonder her eyes looked so old, so tired… Just like his.

And then he remembered. How was she even here in the first place?

“I tried for months to get you back and all I could manage was…” Rose winced. He gulped, letting that sentence end where it did. “How?”

Rose inhaled sharply. “Well, I mean, it’s a long story. Getting to this universe was easy, this time. Just had to input the coordinates into my TARDIS here.” She patted the small shack behind her lovingly. “I’ve been trying to get back to you… And well, _she_ disagreed with me about the time and place, apparently.”

“Oh, well, she tends to do that…” he laughed before catching himself. “I’m sorry, your _what_ , now?”

“She was a gift from you,” she smiled. “Do you want to see? I know she doesn’t look like much right now, but… it’s bigger on the inside.” Rose punctuated the sentence with a wink and that tongue-touched smile that made his knees weak.

The Doctor grinned back. “Better not. Something tells me I’m not supposed to see it yet.”

And that beautiful smile dropped off her face for just a moment. He’d figured her out. To her credit, she recovered almost instantaneously. “You’re gonna have to forget this anyway. Might as well see it all.” She gestured to her TARDIS/shack as though showing it off. “Come on. You know you want to,” she sing-songed.

“It’s gotten so much harder to say no to you,” he sighed in mock resignation.

Rose reached behind her back and opened the door, revealing the interior. The Doctor followed her hesitantly up the ramp and glanced around the console room. He was awestruck by the beauty of her console theme. It didn’t suit him, of course, but it was very Rose. The fixtures were a deep mahogany, including the center console. The closest thing he could to compare it to was an elegant, antique presidential desk that had a bunch of rusty, metal buttons and switches extending from it. Ornate floral motifs were carved along the edge, tracing a path that he imagined Rose followed around the console every time she flew her ship. The Time Rotor in the center was a deep green color, with long, winding vines wrapped around itself and extending to the ceiling. It was earthy and organic, and beautiful, all the same.

“You redecorated,” he observed glibly. “I don’t like it.”

“Oh, you never do,” she quipped, stroking one of the struts. Unlike his coral struts, these were wooden - like curved, swaying willows holding up the ceiling. “Though, technically it’s not redecorating since it’s a completely different TARDIS.”

“Your own TARDIS?” He asked, unbelieving. He couldn’t imagine a future where they reunited and he just sent her off in her own ship. If he got her back, he wasn’t ever letting go. He didn’t voice that objection, and went for one that was much weaker, less painful. “But, mine’s the last one.”

Rose shook her head. “Don’t think about that too much. That’s up to you to find out someday.”

“But-”

“There’s a lot you’re going to go through in the coming years. Don’t skip to the twist before you’ve even read the first chapter. Life’s no fun that way,” she broke out in another smile, nudging his shoulder.

He smiled back. Even a hundred years across the void couldn’t change the Rose he knew and loved. “How am I ever going to let you go again?”

“Because you have to,” Rose reminded him sadly as she leaned in and kissed his cheek. Then she beamed at him as though just remembering something. “You know, you once told me that, when you were stuck in 1969, you blacked out and could never figure out why. You were standing in one place with your little _timey-wimey_ device, and then you were back in that place again, but a whole hour had passed. So… I guess we’ve got about an hour together before I have to let you get back to Martha.”

“How do you know about Martha?”

Rose took the timey-wimey detector from his hand. “Because you told me - you told me everything that happened while we were apart. I know that this thing went off when my TARDIS arrived,” she waved it around for effect before setting it beside the console, “because - and I quote - ‘it goes _ding_ when there’s _stuff_ ’. I’m a bit prettier than Billy Shipton, though, eh?”

The Doctor laughed. “I dunno, haven’t met him yet.”

Rose rolled her eyes. “You’re supposed to say ‘yes’, you git,” she scolded before grabbing his hand and leading him over to an ornate Victorian loveseat on the other side of the console, where the jumpseat was in his own TARDIS. She plopped down on the green brocade cushions and patted the space next to her.

“So, what do you want to do with our little piece of stolen time?” she asked.

He pondered for a moment, reaching for her right hand and lacing his fingers with hers. “I don’t even have an answer.”

God, he had always been such a coward with her. She was the most important person in his life and he’d always been too afraid to let her in, to show her just how he felt. Then he lost her and he had one chance to say goodbye, to finally tell her, and he couldn’t even do it then. He let the time run out instead.

Blast it. He was going to have to forget this in an hour anyway.

He shut his eyes and closed the gap between them, pressing his lips to hers. The kiss was gentle and chaste - and over way too soon. When he pulled away, she stared at him for a second, dazed.

“I love you,” he whispered on the exhale. “I’m so sorry I never said that before.”

In the span of about two seconds, Rose leapt into his lap and planted her lips on his. The Doctor felt like all of time came to a standstill as they connected. Their lips and bodies fit together like they were made for each other - and, he thought as he pulled her closer, he supposed this body _was_ made for her. Regeneration worked in mysterious ways.

It was everything he’d never allowed himself to want from her. The two of them, together… it was an intimacy that would have had the Time Lords clutching their pearls.

It was Rose who finally pulled away. “It would be wrong to take advantage of you like this,” she whispered breathlessly, placing her palms firmly on his chest to keep the distance. “I know so much more than you… and you’re going to forget all this anyway.”

“The memory will come back to me when the time is right,” he protested. He wanted nothing more than to continue what they’d started. “What if I want to be taken advantage of?”

She smiled, but her eyes betrayed her sadness. “I don’t think my heart could take it.” Rose nodded and took a deep breath. “I know! Why don’t you tell me about 1969?” She asked, taking on a chipper tone that he was often known to employ when he wanted to commandeer the conversation.

“You seem to know more about it than even I do,” he reminded her, pulling her hands away from his lapels. He squeezed them ever so slightly, before he felt a strange resistance on her left hand. He lifted it to his eye-line and inspected carefully, furrowing his brow at the sight before him. A thin, ornate gold band on her left ring finger. He’d lived 900 years, and spent a good many of those learning human social conventions… And well, that could only mean one thing.

He cleared his throat. “Who’s the lucky bloke? Ricky the idiot?” He asked, trying not to sound bitter. He was only partly joking about Mickey - and he _really_ hoped he was off base.

She blanched for a moment before breaking out into a chuckle, shaking her head. “Oh, that? Doctor, it’s not what you think.” She quickly pulled her hand away before he could inspect the ring any further. “It’s Mum’s. From when she married Pete - in the other universe. I… keep it on to remember her by.”

For one blissful moment, he could almost believe her.

“Rose Tyler, I never pegged you for a liar.”

Rose stared at him with wide eyes. “What? I-”

He held up his index finger. “You wouldn’t wear it on the left hand if it was Jackie’s. Besides, if this is your mother we’re talking about, marrying Pete Tyler, with all his money and riches… Well, that ring would’ve rivaled Princess Diana’s.”

She cast her gaze downward, rotating the ring around on her finger. “It’s really not what you think.”

“Then what is it? Why won’t you just be honest with me?”

She breathed out slowly through her mouth, deep in thought, before finally raising her head to look him directly in the eyes. “You really think I would ever marry anyone that wasn’t you?”

His respiratory bypass stopped working completely as he gaped at her, his mouth hanging open. He quickly closed it and swallowed. “You mean?” He gestured between them, unable to form the words to the question to which he desperately needed an answer.

She nodded slowly, her tongue poking out between her teeth as she smiled at him. “That’s all coming up ahead for you.”

The Doctor grinned back. “Oh, Rose,” he breathed, “I can’t wait.” He leapt forward and planted his lips on hers once again.

* * *

In the end, the hour passed far too quickly. The Doctor cursed his time senses as he felt every agonizing second slipping away, taking with it his precious little time with Rose. He wished he could fill an eternity in that hour, and live the life with her that they both deserved, that they never had.

They stood at the edge of the alleyway, where he’d first heard her voice again. He was back in his coat and the timey-wimey detector was clutched in his right hand. She took his left and squeezed it tightly, and he memorized the way it felt. His hand in hers - they fit together so perfectly. Another painful reminder that this body was made solely for her and her alone.

Not that memorizing it mattered. He already knew exactly how it felt.

“I missed this face,” Rose sighed, reaching up to cup his cheek with her other hand. “I just wish I didn’t have to leave it again.”

“Then don’t.”

Her eyes clouded. “Don’t have a choice. This time is too vulnerable. If things don’t play out exactly as they’re supposed to - with Billy Shipton and Sally Sparrow…”

“I know. The whole thing would collapse. Reapers would descend…”

“Martha would yell at you,” Rose laughed, finishing his sentence.

“Again,” he tacked on for good measure.

Rose let go of his hand and lifted herself up on her toes. She placed both hands on either side of his face - a silent request. He bowed his head slightly, and she rose up to kiss him gently on the forehead. At least this time, there wasn’t an annoying space helmet in the way. “Keep yourself safe for me,” she murmured. “I’ll be back for you soon.”

And then she walked away, leaving him standing alone in that cold, damp alley. He filed the memory of her away, only to be unlocked and remembered at the right time. He had to let go of her lips, of her voice, of her hand in his, and the little secrets of the future to come - but he held onto the feeling of it all. He decided that no one was allowed to take that blissful feeling away, even if he would have no idea why it was there.

* * *

“You blacked out for an entire hour?” Martha Jones exclaimed loudly as she sat beside him on their ratty sofa later that evening.

The Doctor tugged on his ear in discomfort. “That’s what I said, yes.”

“How does that even happen?” She balked, closing her fingers around the steaming mug of tea he’d prepared for her before she walked in the door. They’d developed a system - it was their best chance at avoiding a row after a long shift at the shop. Martha was still a bit sore about that whole mess. “Were you drunk or something?”

He sighed and glared at her.

“Right, sorry,” Martha rolled her eyes. “Superior biology,” she parroted, sipping her tea.

He chose to ignore her tone. “The most likely explanation is that I ran into a future version of myself.”

She almost spit out her tea. “Excuse me? Why… why would that…?” She sputtered for a few seconds before she settled on just balking at him.

“Well, put rather simply, it’s a paradox,” he answered matter-of-factly. “To preserve the timelines and prevent total collapse of the universe… if I run into a future me, I block the memory,” he spouted off as if it was the simplest thing in the world. To him, it just about was. “Don’t remember it until it happens,” he swallowed, grimacing at how odd it sounded, “again.”

“Do you make a habit of that or something?”

He sucked air through his teeth. “Well… Not exactly. I like to avoid it if I can. Sometimes it’s necessary.”

Martha twisted her face at him in confusion. “And why would that be?”

“To save the universe,” he answered smugly, with a waggle of his eyebrows.

She leaned her head back and groaned. “You’re so full of it! I bet it was just your bad driving, making you land in the wrong time again.” She punched him in the shoulder, giggling.

“Oi!” The Doctor protested, rubbing his wounded shoulder.

Martha just laughed, returning to her tea.

Nursing his bruised ego, he picked up his own mug and took a sip, finding relief in the free radicals and tannins. “It’s odd,” the Doctor spoke up again after a few minutes of comfortable silence, “when I came back to myself, and I realized an hour had passed… I just had this _feeling_.” He emphasized the last word, trying to imbue it with all the bliss and warmth that he’d felt earlier that day, which still lingered on his lips, on his forehead, in his hearts.

Martha raised an eyebrow. “What kind of feeling?”

“I don’t really know how to describe it,” he sighed, setting down the mug and running his free hand through his hair. “It was warm, and sort of fuzzy and…” he paused as he decided on the right word. The feeling was so eerily close to _love,_ but with Martha and all of her… well, crush, sitting next to him, he figured he should settle on something a bit less charged.

“And?”

“It felt like… hope,” he sighed wistfully. “I never feel like that after meeting myself. Trust me.”

She glanced at him, skeptical. “Are you sure you weren’t drunk?”

“No, I didn’t have any ginger,” he remarked off-handedly. “But, I know something really good happened to me during that hour,” he insisted. “I just have no idea what it was.”

Martha patted his knee and smiled at him - a kind, placating smile. “Maybe it’s a mystery that will never be solved.”

“Perhaps,” he conceded, settling back against the cushions and effectively dropping the topic. As he sat with Martha, sipping their tea in silence, he still couldn’t shake that feeling. That _love_ that filled his hearts stayed the whole time. He hadn’t felt anything like that in so long. Well… Ever since _Rose._

Whatever happened in that hour, the Doctor knew it had to be _absolutely fantastic_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my first story I've posted here, but I've written elsewhere and I have thick skin so please tell me what you think! 
> 
> I have two more chapters of this planned. One will be from Rose's perspective and the final chapter will be a fix-it/happy ending of sorts. I'll post them as I finish them. 
> 
> Also, whatever you do or don't celebrate, I hope you have a fantastic time! Thank you so much for reading my little story here.


	2. Committed to Memory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose struggles with her grief in the aftermath of 1969.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo... it took me a lot longer to post this chapter than I planned. I'm very sorry for the wait. I had a family emergency two days after the first chapter was posted, and it drained me emotionally and I had a hard time getting back to writing, especially this piece, since I sort of associated it with the event in my mind. This chapter gets WAY more angsty than I anticipated, so I think I may have been projecting here? You've been warned. 
> 
> But I poured a lot of my heart into this chapter and I found some catharsis while working on it. I hope you all like it! Thank you for all the love so far and for being patient with me! Hopefully the wait for the final chapter will be shorter. It all depends. The next couple weeks are going to be VERY busy, but I'll do my best!

Rose Tyler braced herself against the console, trembling with exhaustion, as the TARDIS finally settled with a disgruntled thump. She had just enough in her to glance at the monitor and make sure they’d actually found the right dimension. One shot, she’d promised, so as not to bring about the end of the universe (again). And, it wasn’t as though the dimension cannon was known for its accuracy - the remains of which were installed into the ship’s center console, ensuring that her trip back was even possible. Combined with the whims of the TARDIS, the whole thing had been a shot in the dark.

Literally.

She focused on the end of the string of coordinates and ignored the rest - she could confirm the specific time and location later, and course correct as necessary. For now, she’d made it: the prime universe.

Her original universe.

The Doctor’s universe.

“We did it,” Rose smiled at the screen, pressing her forehead to it and allowing herself to revel in her victory for a moment. “We actually did it.”

The residual energy slipped away from her in a single breath. She closed her eyes in relief and lowered herself down to the grating. She was going to need a minute.

There was no way to know how long they’d been hurtling through the void like that - minutes? Hours? Decades? And she’d had to steer it actively the whole way - with white knuckles manning the console and nothing but panic and her late husband’s strict instructions on a loop on her mind. If flying the TARDIS could be effectively compared to airline travel, then this particular experience was less like a first-class 737 and more like the equivalent of piloting a rickety seaplane through the Bermuda Triangle.

With no fuel or navigation.

During a hurricane.

Multiplied by about a thousand.

Rose was surprised that her beloved ship hadn’t caught fire, or imploded, or something equally violent and melodramatic - as she tended to do. Always to make a point, mind. Her ship’s unpredictable behavior was distinct from the Doctor’s original TARDIS, who was almost always rebelling against misuse. Her TARDIS threw fits which were more like… toddler tantrums. On steroids.

But… if the reassuring waves caressing the back of her mind were anything to go by, the TARDIS was doing just fine.

In fact, she was eager for another trip. Practically trembling with excitement and wonder, it almost felt like she was begging - no, _whining_ \- to go somewhere. Rose lifted her head wearily, shooting a withering glare at the time rotor. “No,” she scolded firmly. “I need to catch my breath. And maybe sleep for a week.”

A mallet began to pound behind her eyes, the tension of the whole ordeal finally seeping into her bones. “Or a month,” she added weakly.

The TARDIS backed off with a single dejected hum. Relieved, Rose grabbed onto the edge of the console and expended about the last of her energy reserves pulling herself to her feet. She staggered the two yards over to the green loveseat and collapsed into it, stretching out and getting as comfortable as possible given how exhausted she was.

Were the dimension jumps always this bad? She seemed to remember them being quicker. And much less painful. But, then again, that was almost 90 years ago. Catapulting a measly human through the universal walls was probably a lot less involved than trying it with a whole trans-dimensional time ship. Not to mention the fact that they hadn’t even been able to salvage the entire dimension cannon. Or that their TARDIS was effectively hacked and modified so much to even be able to grow in their lifetimes… and the original console was cobbled together from spare parts in a universe where neither TARDISes nor Time Lords ever existed. Even though the ship had updated her theme recently, her inner matrix was much the same as it had always been - she could only use what machinery she had at her disposal, after all.

Again, the fact that they made it out of the void at all was somewhat of a miracle, Rose thought as she shut her eyes and tried to rest her aching head.

* * *

She must have dozed off at some point, because the next thing she knew, the TARDIS was effectively nudging her awake through pointed tugs at their bond.

The ship rejoiced in her head as she awoke.

Rose pushed herself up on her elbows and groaned. She could only have been asleep for a handful of hours. She didn’t have time-senses like the Doctor, and there wasn’t a clock anywhere in sight (not that it mattered in the TARDIS), but she certainly wasn’t fully rested. Her joints creaked like old door hinges and her legs felt as though someone had poured cement in them.

The TARDIS poked aggressively at her mind. The ship never used her own words, but the meaning was crystal clear: _get up already!_

“What is it?” She grumbled at the ship, begrudgingly getting up from the loveseat and stumbling over to the monitor. “Not a distress signal, I hope. I don’t think I’m ready for that.”

Rose furrowed her brow as she read the plain English on the screen. No signals, messages, alerts… anything. Just the coordinates for their current location, which roughly translated as: 5:13 PM, 15/04/2057, Dårlig Ulv Stranden, Norway… or, at least, the prime universe equivalent. Oh. That’s right. They’d left from Pete’s World via Bad Wolf Bay, of course they’d have to land there on the other side.

Returning to the Doctor via the very place he’d dumped her nearly a century ago.

The irony of that wasn’t lost on her.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” she sighed, moving over to the other side of the console, ready to set coordinates for another destination - what exactly, she currently had no idea. “We’ll shove off. Just give me a mo.”

The TARDIS sent her a wave of excitement. An image of her husband - the Doctor - appeared in her mind. Her ship was positively buzzing with eager energy, nudging her forward like a wing woman with a one too many drinks in her. Well, at least the TARDIS got her type better than Keisha did.

Rose’s heart clenched in fear. Getting back to the Doctor was her end goal in all this, of course it was, but the idea of reuniting with him someday and the prospect of actually doing it (especially right now) were two very different things. There was so much left unsaid between them, so much still uncertain, so many variables. What if she couldn’t find him again? What if it had been too long in his timeline and he’d forgotten her? What if he’d changed again? What if he was angry with her for coming back? What if-

The ship pushed her again, this time much more firmly.

The Doctor’s voice rang out in her head - a memory from long ago. _“How long are you going to stay with me?” He’d asked, even though he already knew the answer._

_“Forever,” she’d promised. And she’d meant every syllable._

Another memory followed, this time with her taking the lead. _“You just leave us behind,” she’d accused, her tone biting with betrayal. “Is that what you’re going to do to me?”_

_“No,” he’d shot back, his resolve firm. “Not to you.”_

Another one. _“I thought… cause I changed…” he’d trailed off, his eyes begging not to finish that sentence._

_“Yeah, I thought cause you changed… you might not want me anymore,” she’d added, insecurity poking out between her words despite her best efforts._

_“Oh, I’d love you to come!” He’d swiftly responded with the widest smile, love and excitement and sweet relief washing over his face._

And another. _“Rose, before I go, I just want to tell you,” a Northern accent had told her with unshed tears still in his eyes, his voice just beginning to crack. “You were fantastic - absolutely fantastic.”_

Love and reassurance pulsed over her bond with the ship. She glanced up at the ceiling reluctantly, her heart swelling with hope. “You really think all that still applies?”

There was that nudging again.

“Alright, alright. Let’s do it!” Rose relented, beginning to set the controls in motion. “London, 2010. Post-Crucible. Sure to run into him there at some point,” she grinned, entering in the coordinates and shifting into her dance around the console. She paused, holding her breath and daring to believe it would all be alright. “Please, _please_ take me to him,” she added breathlessly before pulling the dematerialization lever with a flourish.

The TARDIS landed a bit roughly and Rose bit her lip before checking the monitor, making sure they had truly landed where she’d intended.

Everything she’d been feeling had left her in a whoosh when she saw the destination spelled out for her on the screen. The joyful reunion she planned, the image of the smile on his face when he saw her again, the hugs and the twirling and the happy tears and the adventures to follow…

All that came crashing down.

21 June, 1969. Exactly ten past two in the afternoon. All spelled out clearly in the coordinates listed in the corner of the screen.

A cold feeling of dread hit her square in the gut.

He - her husband - he’d mentioned that date, that time, one day while working in their lab at UNIT, after a long diatribe about the primitive technology of the 1960’s. At the time, Rose had just waved it off as insignificant. After all, she’d had a few experiences like that herself on the TARDIS, pre-Canary Wharf. There was an hour missing here, two days there, and not to mention the whole “twelve hours was actually twelve months” incident…

But this… There was no way this was a coincidence.

* * *

_“You know, I lost a whole hour in 1969,”the part-human Doctor had said to her while tinkering with their then-infant TARDIS. “June twenty-first, exactly 2:10 in the afternoon, and my timey-wimey detector had just gone off!”_

_“Did it now?” Rose had humored him, perched on a counter._

_“That it did,” he laughed. “Thought it was Billy Shipton - so, I ran to greet him. Only no one was there. I was about to call it a day when all of a sudden, I was standing in the exact same place - only an hour later. 3:35. My time-senses were super sharp back then, so I could feel the difference instantly and… ugh, it nearly made me nauseous. Almost like…” he’d paused then, ruffling his hair and searching for the right way to explain it, before pointing his finger at her excitedly and shouting, “getting off the ice after skating for a long time! That’s it - that’s what time differentials feel like.”_

_“Because the ground’s no longer moving?” She’d tried to relate. “But… you’re body’s used to the motion so it just feels wrong and… wobbly?”_

_“Exactly!” He’d grinned proudly. “Well, close enough.”_

_“So, you lost an hour and got motion sickness?” Rose had asked then, skeptical. “That’s it?”_

_His face twisted then, then he took a breath and shook his head. “That and… I felt something else.”_

_“I’m not so sure I want to know actually…” Rose had teased, half serious._

_He guffawed and jumped to correct her. “No no no, it was this really good feeling, Warm and all sort of… hopeful and excited. A bit pink and yellow, for lack of a better descriptor. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say it was a lot like how I feel when I’m with you.”_

* * *

For a moment, Rose bitterly wished that she had been right about 21 June, 1969.

She braced herself and dragged her feet out of the TARDIS.

And then she saw _him,_ standing at the other end of the dark, grey alley her ship parked itself in. A tall handsome man in a long brown overcoat, carrying what could only be described as a souped-up Fisher Price toy, looking around frantically - as though he knew he was there for her, not Billy. The image struck her like a knife through her heart. She almost just hung back to watch him, out of sight. Catch a glimpse now and hold on to it forever - it was so much less painful to stand back and observe. Reapers be damned; time could compensate for a measly hour.

But in the end, watching him there wasn’t enough and seventy odd years of being married to a Time Lord (even a human-hybrid one) made her a bit of a stickler for the rules. So, she played her part and called out to him.

“Hi.”

The Time Lord did exactly as he was supposed to do and threw himself right into her arms.

God, he felt so right in her arms.

Swallow the hour like a sour dose of cough medicine, Rose told herself as she held him close. Give him those feelings of love and warmth that he described so happily to her over tea, all those years ago. Make sure everything plays out exactly as it was always written - a predetermined course of events.

Oh, but this was never going to be bitter, was it? She realized that as soon as she found herself showing off her beautiful TARDIS, a cheeky grin spreading across her face involuntarily. Inviting him inside didn’t even require a second thought. Being with him was wired into her biology - every single cell.

All of her apprehension had melted away the second her eyes met his.

* * *

Just when she was starting to worry they’d run out of conversation after only ten minutes, he told her. He didn’t fade into cold air and nothing before he could finish the sentence. He didn’t brush her off and run away without saying goodbye.

He told her three simple words.

“I love you.”

He really could say it.

This Doctor, fully Time Lord, pre-human metacrisis, actually had it in him all along.

Things were so perfect until he started asking questions. Questions she couldn’t really answer properly. The real answers would break his hearts and she couldn’t bear to see him like that. He was right when he called her out on her lie about the ring - so, instead of lying, she did the next best thing. She gave him vague allusions and half-truths.

He laid with his head in her lap, staring up at her. “Where am I?” He asked suddenly. Rose opened her mouth to give him the sarcastic answer and hopefully end the inquiry right there, but he corrected himself. “Right now, where am I? Why aren’t I with you?”

The Doctor wore a pained expression on his face. She didn’t need to read his mind to know what he was thinking. He was afraid of the truth, but he still needed to know.

Rose considered her answer while she ran her fingers gently through his hair. That really great hair that stayed full and just as crazy to the end, she remembered fondly (even after it went shock white around the approximate age of 81). “We got separated. I’m on my way back now.” She hoped he would leave it at that. It was true. Just not the whole truth, not even close.

The Doctor scrambled out of her lap and into a sitting position. “How? What happened?” He pressed desperately. Even though they’d been apart for so long, he still knew her so well. Rose looked away, praying she could hide the pain in her eyes. “It’s more than you’re saying. What did I do? How did I hurt you?”

“Nothing, I promise. You just had to leave for a bit and I couldn’t come with you,” she chuckled. Still not a lie. “God, you worry too much.”

He still didn’t believe her. It was there in his eyes. “Whatever it is, I’m sorry, Rose,” he told her sincerely, reaching out to tuck a stray hair behind her ear. “Please forgive me.”

Oh, she already had.

* * *

They had an hour - nothing more and nothing less - and she knew it from the start. An hour was far too little to hold on to and far too much to just let go.

Rose left the Doctor, standing there clueless in the entrance of the alley - right where she’d first laid eyes on him again. She walked away with all the grace of a classically trained dancer, with not much more said between them than an unspoken goodbye and a promise of a future happy ending. Though, a happy ending felt more like a mean-spirited lie at this point. Still, she kept her pace even and her chin up high as she strode back to her ship, not making a single sound as she slipped away.

That balanced composure broke the second she closed the doors of her TARDIS behind her with a gentle click.

Safely inside, Rose crumpled against the door, all the emotional strength drained from her bones.Burning tears prickled at the rims of her eyes, threatening to spill over. All she wanted to do in that moment (well, the only thing that wouldn’t cause a paradox) was to slide down the door, 80’s-teen-movie-style, curl up in the tightest of balls, and let the tears come through the floodgates. In fact, she wondered if it was all she was currently physically capable of doing. It would be so easy to give in.

But, no. She had to get out of there first. With a deep, shaky breath, Rose strengthened the dam in her heart, willing it to hold just a bit longer. She pushed herself back off the doors and rushed up the ramp toward the console, carrying herself with a newfound resolve - albeit unstable and most definitely fleeting.

The TARDIS sent her a rush of sympathy over their link, but Rose ignored it as she rubbed her hands together and tried to remember just where she had been planning on going in the first place. It certainly wasn’t a stinking alley in 1969. She drew up nothing but a blank page where her thoughts used to be.

With a frustrated growl, she quickly moved through the motions of sending her ship into the vortex before collapsing against the loveseat. She stared up at the time rotor, seething.

“What was that, huh?” she asked her ship, her voice raising an octave. “Some sort of cruel joke?” The TARDIS hummed apologetically in the back of her mind. Rose squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head, heat growing in her cheeks. “No!” She shouted into the empty expanse of the console room. “You don’t get to do that! You don’t get to be sorry!”

There was a heavy pause while Rose waited for a response. There wasn’t one.

“ _Now_ you’re quiet?!” She asked incredulously. They certainly weren’t finished. “How dare you? You take me back there, knowing I’d have to leave him, even after he…” her breath hitched. “He… He said it. He actually _said it_! He’d never been able to say it before! He couldn’t say it when he left me! Why now? That one wasn’t human yet, he shouldn’t have been able to-”

She stopped, halted in her tracks, as it dawned on her.

The TARDIS tried again, sending another soothing caress along their bond. Rose opened her mouth to protest once more, but could only manage a choked sob. The dam finally broke, unable to hold up under the pressure. With nothing left to stop them, the tears flowed freely down her cheeks. She pulled her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around herself.

Rose gasped in between sobs. “I miss him so much, baby girl,” she whimpered.

The TARDIS hummed softly, almost imperceptibly, and it may have been the saddest sound Rose’d ever heard - a delicate song in a minor key, emanating with deeply felt melancholy.

She missed him, too. Not the one they’d left in 1969, and definitely not the one that left her precious Rose behind at Bad Wolf Bay - the Doctor that this TARDIS barely knew, relatively speaking. She missed _her_ Doctor, with one single heart that he wore on his sleeve, who loved his Rose and his baby TARDIS and the fantastic Tyler family with everything he had. The one who grew her from a tiny, dying piece of coral in a repurposed lab at UNIT with nothing but scraps and spare parts. The Doctor with a human lifespan that was longer than most got, but still far too short for a man so wonderful.

She missed the Doctor who was still the Doctor in every way that mattered, except in the one crucial way that made him so special.

She dimmed her lights, before flashing them a few times. Not insistently, nor eagerly. It was a careful nudge - she was giving her Rose a chance to gather herself first. The lights danced to a slow beat, growing brighter (1… 2… 3… 4…) before dimming again (1… 2… 3… 4…), repeating on a consistent loop for precisely 20 minutes and 45 seconds until Rose’s sobs quieted, and she lifted her eyes and caught on to the message.

Rose blinked up at the rotor blearily, wiping the salty tears from her cheeks. “What is it, baby girl?” She asked with a pitiful sniff, her shoulders sagging and trembling almost imperceptibly from exhaustion.

The TARDIS woke up the monitor and hummed softly, then changed the pattern of the oscillating backlight behind the coordinate keys.

She knew where she needed to go next.

With a hesitant sigh, Rose pulled herself off the couch and made her way back over to the console. She glanced over the blinking keys, green and blue lights washing over the keypad in a smooth wave. “You want me to go somewhere? I’m sorry, but I really don’t think I’m in the mood…” Her voice cracked and she began to turn away again.

The hum changed pitch. Higher, this time. The lights beneath the keys grew in brightness, the wave increasing in tempo. A silent promise.

Rose shut her eyes, considering for a moment. When she opened them, a hesitant smile ghosted over her face. “Alright, but only if you promise it’s not the bleeding Slitheen again.”

The TARDIS hummed brightly.

No Slitheen. That was a guarantee.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I struggled a lot with this, in part because of my life but also because I wanted to get Rose's emotional state right. I feel like the transition, from her human Doctor to the Time Lord one, would be complex and difficult for her, with a lot of conflicting emotions. Especially if she got the life she wanted and deserved with Tentoo in Pete's World, which I really like to think she did. Grief is a funny thing and it creeps up in weird ways, and I wanted to reflect that in this piece. 
> 
> On a lighter note, I had a blast writing Rose's TARDIS. I really wanted to find a way to distinguish between the TARDIS we all know and love and this sort of original TARDIS. 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading and sticking with me so far! Sorry again for the wait. Please let me know what you think!
> 
> EDIT: I forgot to credit the quotes used. In order: "Army of Ghosts", "School Reunion", "The Christmas Invasion", and "The Parting of the Ways"


End file.
